Working memory load and distraction: dissociable effects of visual maintenance and cognitive control

Konstantinou, Nikos; Beal, Eleanor; King, Jean-Rémi; Lavie, Nilli · 2014 · OpenAlex-citations

DOI: 10.3758/s13414-014-0742-z

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Summary

This study investigates the dissociable effects of working memory (WM) load on selective attention, specifically distinguishing between visual maintenance and cognitive control functions. Guided by load theory, the authors hypothesized that while high WM cognitive control load increases distractor processing by impairing executive control, high visual short-term memory (VSTM) load should reduce distractor processing by consuming sensory capacity similar to high perceptual load. The research aimed to establish this functional distinction by measuring distractor rejection efficiency under varying WM loads. The experimental design comprised two main experiments using a dual-task paradigm. Participants performed a VSTM task requiring them to remember a set of items (colored squares in Experiment 1; letters or symbols in Experiment 2) while simultaneously engaging in a response competition task involving speeded responses to target letters in the presence of congruent or incongruent distractors. Experiment 1 manipulated VSTM load by varying the number of items (one vs. four) during either the encoding phase (Experiment 1a) or the maintenance delay period (Experiment 1b). Experiment 2 compared VSTM maintenance load (using meaningless symbols to prevent verbalization) with WM cognitive control load (using letters requiring verbal rehearsal), varying set size from one to six items. Distractor interference was quantified by the difference in response times between incongruent and congruent conditions. The results confirmed the predicted dissociation. In Experiment 1, increasing VSTM load during both encoding and maintenance significantly reduced the distractor congruency effect, indicating less interference from irrelevant stimuli. This reduction was driven by faster responses in the incongruent condition under high load, suggesting that the sensory capacity required for visual maintenance was unavailable for processing distractors. In contrast, Experiment 2 demonstrated that loading WM cognitive control via verbal rehearsal significantly increased the distractor congruency effect, leading to greater interference. This effect was driven by slower responses in the incongruent condition, reflecting impaired executive control over attention. No such increase in distraction was observed when VSTM load was manipulated using non-verbalizable symbols. These findings provide a novel functional distinction between the roles of WM maintenance and cognitive control in selective attention. The study confirms that visual maintenance recruits sensory resources, thereby protecting against distraction when load is high, whereas cognitive control relies on executive resources that, when taxed, fail to suppress irrelevant information. This supports load theory’s capacity-based approach to attention and highlights that the impact of WM load on distraction depends critically on the specific cognitive function being engaged.

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Topics

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• working memory
• executive function